Storked! Challenge: Tell Me About Your City In Six Words

Hi, everyone. TGIF! What are you doing this weekend? I'm going to a really cool event in NYC on Sunday evening. It's called "The Big Apple in Six Words", and it's hosted by Amy Sohn, author of Prospect Park West (Storked! readers, you'll LOVE this book--I did!), A.J. Jacobs, Ben Yagoda and the editors of Smith magazine, Larry Smith and Rachel Fershleiser. NYC in six words, huh? Want to know what mine are?

I love New York City--you all know that, but when I sat down to write my six-word memoir, I was surprised by the recurring theme that played on repeat in my head. Before JD, I might have submitted: Chrissy does sex and the city. Guess what: NYC doesn't mean cocktails, shoes and men anymore. It doesn't mean opened-ended, mimosa-soaked brunches at Jane. It doesn't mean the Nolita apartment that my friends and I affectionately called "the SoHo Palace." Doesn't mean gallery openings, clubs in Chelsea or sharing pitchers at dive bars on the LES.

It means getting pregnant when I was 26 and dealing with it alone. It means eating in a diner by myself in Turtle Bay when I was six months pregnant. It means panic attacks in my NYC apartment on 50th and Second at 3 A.M. It means the chaos of NYC rushing past me and the bitter cold winter air slapping me across the face as I walked to the subway with my belly growing uncontrollably under my coat. It meant the morning__ light__ that appeared splotched on my bedroom floor each morning. That__ light__ got me out of bed. That light led to__ calm.__ It bled into me like winter did into spring--and spring into the hottest NYC summer I'd ever experienced. Sweat was beaded on my brow as I packed up my apartment, and that task led to acceptance, led to calm. Sure, the chaos returns itself. It often does, but the__ calm__ is still there. It remains. The__ calm__ is JD when he's pressed against my side at 7:30 P.M. each night while I read to him.

Tell me, what does your current city mean to you? Six words only, now. Have a six word memoir about NYC? Submit it here. (I submitted!)